Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

Coastalwatch

 I don't believe Climate change recognises borders or politics.

I'm just enjoying the progress made with the roll out of EV's and renewable energy in general wherever it may be manufactured. If there was even more here in the uk then I should be truly ecstatic.

Exiled_Tyke

Nice article summarising the current status of EV v's Hydrogen. Again pretty much stuff we all know: 

1. Hydrogen is too far behind to realistically catch up with EV's for domestic cars. (Particularly with infrastructure investment).
2. Making hydrogen wastes incredible amounts of energy as heat
3. Toyota really do appear to have lost the plot and backed the wrong horse

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/13/will-hydrogen-overtake-batteries-in-the-race-for-zero-emission-cars

ABrass

The EU has CO2 fleet requirements which our EV quits is inspired by. 

https://dieselnet.com/standards/eu/ghg.php

It's more complicated but the short version is that each manufacturers averaged CO2 emissions must be below that years thresholds. EVs get bonus points so there's a strong incentive to get enough EVs sold to allow them to keep selling SUVs.

Martyn1981

I mentioned a few days ago about a series of articles looking at BEV adoption in S. America.

Here are the 3 articles, covering 12 countries, (several more are missing, as explained in the article). We have Argentina at 0.08% last year, rising to several at ~3%, with a standout of 11.6% in Costa Rica. Based on the 3% figure, I'd suggest that's about 4yrs behind the UK, perhaps 2yrs behind N. America.

I find this information useful, just to get a rough overview of how the world market is developing, outside of the largest markets (China, Europe and the US). PEV's appear to have acccounted for about 18% of World car sales last year, and expected to exceed 20% this year, with a very rough split of 70% BEV's, 30% PHEV's.

Latin America 2023 EV Sales Report, Part 1: The Laggards (Argentina, Perú, Ecuador, Chile, Dominican Republic)

We’re back with our report on EV sales in Latin America! There are some novelties, but, contrary to my expectations, the distance between the laggards and the leaders is actually increasing: this means that the first part of the report will be full of bad (or, at best, “meh”) news, while the last part will be full of exciting changes.

This is likely to be the last report of this kind I write. In late 2023, the transition started to speed up in several countries, so there’s more to report than can be said in a couple of paragraphs every six months. Meanwhile, other countries are basically stagnant. Because of this, I’ll try to maintain bi-annual or yearly reports for the least electrified markets, but I’ll start writing sales reports more often regarding countries where EVs are advancing rapidly: I already hinted at this with the news on Brazil’s impressive growth in H2 2023.

Some of you may notice there are Latin American countries missing from this list. This mainly has to do with information on these markets being unavailable. I’ve searched far and wide, but if you have access to data for any of the countries I’m missing (Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Paraguay), please feel free to comment and I’ll be sure to add them in the next report.

Having said that, let’s begin! Remember that BEV or PHEV data will be presented depending on what’s available for each particular country.

Latin American EV Sales Report, Part 2: The Promising Middle (Mexico, Panama, Brazil, Puerto Rico)

Latin America EV Sales Report, Part 3: Leaders on the Podium (Colombia, Uruguay, Costa Rica)

Coastalwatch

Thanks for that Mart, it's certainly encouraging to see growth in those emerging markets. Watch this space as they say.

Something that intrigued was the price of the Dolphin in Brazil stated at $30,000. I was of the understanding that it was generally very competitively priced but that figure seems questionable unless it attracts additional taxation which heavily inflates it's price.

On the other hand if the price was in R$ it only works out to around £5k!

With apologies for mixing up the currencies.

JKenH

ABrass said:

The EU has CO2 fleet requirements which our EV quits is inspired by. 

https://dieselnet.com/standards/eu/ghg.php

It's more complicated but the short version is that each manufacturers averaged CO2 emissions must be below that years thresholds. EVs get bonus points so there's a strong incentive to get enough EVs sold to allow them to keep selling SUVs.

A Freudian slip?

JKenH

Exiled_Tyke said:

Nice article summarising the current status of EV v's Hydrogen. Again pretty much stuff we all know: 

1. Hydrogen is too far behind to realistically catch up with EV's for domestic cars. (Particularly with infrastructure investment).
2. Making hydrogen wastes incredible amounts of energy as heat
3. Toyota really do appear to have lost the plot and backed the wrong horse

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/13/will-hydrogen-overtake-batteries-in-the-race-for-zero-emission-cars

Maybe not.

Japanese Automakers Are Using Profits From Hybrids To Fund EVs

The pub reports Honda, Toyota, and Mazda have all found hybrid sales in their domestic markets to be boosting overall revenue. In fact, each one of these automakers saw a sharp uptick year-over-year, setting a record profit for Toyota and near-record profits for Honda and Mazda. And as high-margin products, hybrids have been the key to this. (As for automakers with few hybrids like Nissan and Mitsubishi, they're not doing as well.)

That much-needed profit is being re-invested by automakers during a time when the shift in business is costing billions. Now, flush with cash, manufacturers can more comfortably fund the pivot from ICE to electrification in key markets as new models, platforms, and strategies debut over the next five to ten years.

https://insideevs.com/news/708479/honda-toyota-mazda-hybrid-evs/

Exiled_Tyke

JKenH said:

Exiled_Tyke said:

Nice article summarising the current status of EV v's Hydrogen. Again pretty much stuff we all know: 

1. Hydrogen is too far behind to realistically catch up with EV's for domestic cars. (Particularly with infrastructure investment).
2. Making hydrogen wastes incredible amounts of energy as heat
3. Toyota really do appear to have lost the plot and backed the wrong horse

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/13/will-hydrogen-overtake-batteries-in-the-race-for-zero-emission-cars

Maybe not.

Japanese Automakers Are Using Profits From Hybrids To Fund EVs

The pub reports Honda, Toyota, and Mazda have all found hybrid sales in their domestic markets to be boosting overall revenue. In fact, each one of these automakers saw a sharp uptick year-over-year, setting a record profit for Toyota and near-record profits for Honda and Mazda. And as high-margin products, hybrids have been the key to this. (As for automakers with few hybrids like Nissan and Mitsubishi, they're not doing as well.)

That much-needed profit is being re-invested by automakers during a time when the shift in business is costing billions. Now, flush with cash, manufacturers can more comfortably fund the pivot from ICE to electrification in key markets as new models, platforms, and strategies debut over the next five to ten years.

https://insideevs.com/news/708479/honda-toyota-mazda-hybrid-evs/

I can't find anything in here to suggest that Toyota are investing in pure BEV's (am I missing something?). But if they are that's great news.  

Magnitio

Exiled_Tyke said:

I can't find anything in here to suggest that Toyota are investing in pure BEV's (am I missing something?). But if they are that's great news.  

https://www.toyota-europe.com/electrification/bev

JKenH

Not a big investment but at least it’s in the UK. 

Ford cuts ribbon on £24m EV test and development facility

Expanded Essex facility to support US carmaker's plans to launch nine further electric car and van models in the UK by 2025

Ford has cut the ribbon on its new £24m electric vehicle (EV) powertrain test and development centre at the auto giant's UK headquarters in Essex, as it gears up to launch a wave of new electric cars and vans in the coming years.

Officially opened yesterday, the Propulsion Development Laboratory's test rooms are designed to pilot EV, hybrid, and internal combustion engine powertrains, while boasting the ability to "flex between technologies in anticipation of market changes and customer changes", Ford said.

https://www.businessgreen.com/news/4174323/ford-cuts-ribbon-gbp24m-ev-test-development-facility